IT sector leads in patent prowess Date:   Sunday , February 01, 2009 The struggle to keep their foot firm amidst the sliding economy did not deter the IT sector to spark off their intellectual properties. Top IT players like Microsoft, Intel and IBM has asserted their intellectual prowess filing as many as 1700 patent applications. The normal high scoring sectors like aerospace and pharmaceutical fell behind IT patent prodigy . The IEEE Spectrum’s patent prowess survey zeroed on the scores on various measures of patent quality such as how often a given patent is cited and number of patents filed. While electronic majors like Hitachi, Matsushita, Xerox and Sony retained their positions in the electronic category, electronic ink company E Ink jumped to the third position in the computer peripherals and storage section. The keen interest might be triggered by the surge in the number of patents granted. India’s lackadaisical approach has witnessed a sea-change where around 10,132 patents of the 30,000 applications have been granted in 2007, compared to 7,500 grants made out of 29,000 in 2006. As per a survey by a leading newspaper Mint, along with filing in more patents, the firms are strategically roping in experienced staff from the patent offices, which help the firms to file error-free applications resulting in a 150 percent surge in grants. The country saw the highest number of applications from Hindustan Unilever Limited at 391 patents, followed by Honda, Samsung, Qualcomm and Intel. Bucking the normal trend of an increase in the patents filed, applications from foreign organizations and individuals in U.S. has merely surged by three percent from 44 percent in 1997 to 47 percent in 2007.